A decade after the Flint, Michigan, water crisis raised alarms about the dangers of lead in tap water, President Joe Biden is setting a 10-year deadline for U.S. cities to replace lead pipes and make drinking water safe for all Americans.

A decade after the Flint, Michigan, water crisis raised alarms about the continuing dangers of lead in tap water, President Joe Biden is setting a 10-year deadline for cities across the nation to replace their lead pipes, finalizing an aggressive approach aimed at ensuring that drinking water is safe for all Americans.

Biden is expected to announce the final Environmental Protection Agency rule Tuesday in the swing state of Wisconsin during the final month of a tight presidential campaign. The announcement highlights an issue — safe drinking water — that Kamala Harris has prioritized as vice president and during her presidential campaign. The new rule supplants a looser standard set by former President Donald Trump’s administration that did not include a universal requirement to replace lead pipes.

Biden and Harris believe it’s “a moral imperative” to ensure that everyone has access to clean drinking water, EPA Administrator Michael Regan told reporters Monday. “We know that over 9 million legacy lead pipes continue to deliver water to homes across our country. But the science has been clear for decades: There is no safe level of lead in our drinking water.’’

  • MobileDecay@lemmy.world
    16·
    1 month ago

    I mean Flint’s problems were caused by switching the water source to save money, not lead pipes. However, replacing lead pipes would be great as well. Most drinking water in America is very safe though. It just tastes like crap.

    • TeoTwawki@lemmy.worldEnglish
      10·
      1 month ago

      if the pipes hadn’t been lead the water switch would not have triggered the issue. we had 3 contributing factors: old lead pipes, water source change, and people in charge that made a decision they should not have been able to make with little to no consequences for doing it.

      Guess which ones out of those 3 we actually have the power to act on.

      • TeoTwawki@lemmy.worldEnglish
        1·
        1 month ago

        very much wish more people were on board with wiping out american crapitalism in particular.

        (not a typo)

        Instead its just a cancer spreading to the rest of the globe as people fail to see its just the logical conclusion to thier impossible to sustain forever growth model - given enough time, all capitalism will become this steaming pile.